What system could I change to?

I am currently using a Nikon D5300 with a 40mm macro lens to do my macro photography. The reason for this is I can no longer get down close to the ground to look through the view finder even with an angle finder. I do have a D750 and a D7200 and I am happy with those but they do not work for me with the macro photography.

The D5300 works well except for two areas that I find displeasing.

One is the look of the files, they look 'rough' and I don't mean noise - there is an intrinsic look to the files I don't like.

The Second is the lack of AF fine tine on the camera and I can see the lens is front focusing a tad and I have to compensate for that when setting up the shots.

The feature that works really well is the fully articulated screen that enables me to shoot orchids in portrait mode from a tripod whilst sitting on a small chair. I can zoom in and get good focus and manually adjust for more accuracy before using my remote to take the shot.

The D750 has a semi articulated screen but is no good in portrait mode.

So what I am looking for is a reasonably priced camera and AF macro lens 90 - 105 or equivalent with a fully articulated screen with MP's around the 20-30's. Live View functionality is important. Macro work would be the only real priority for the outfit.

Hi Kim

Cannot help you with the system suggestion.  E.J. and others surely can.

But wanted to corroborate with a statement you made.  Your words.......... "One is the look of the files, they look 'rough' and I don't mean noise - there is an intrinsic look to the files I don't like."

Most of us have read folks claiming that the DX and FX files look so much different, but it did not sink in with me until I saw it myself.  

This image was taken with the D610, 80-400 AFS and Canon 500D close-up lens.  I happen to hit it just right, offhand, outside the canoe in sedges (on sandy bottom), and when I blew it up, it was like WOW!  

Now on the DX side, I have shot several of the same dragonfly subjects, but with the DX (D500), 80-400AFS and Canon 500D.  None of these DX images have the same impact of this one FX image.   I do admit that I happen to catch this particular FX image just right, as it is the only "WOW" one I have of these Odonatans.  All others are just average macros....yes sharp, but not with nearly the impact.  

So, I love that D610 FX file potential for super close-ups with WOW impact.  And I would guess that all the FX's have that same potential, maybe even greater with the D810, which may be my next body.

But maybe E.J. and/or others will have an alternate "system" suggestion for you, that I too will become interested in for my close-up work.  I also love the articulating LCD for this task.   Used it on this "several-seconds" long American Bullfrog video shot from over the top of the gunwale and down to the water surface.  Getting out of the canoe, no matter how slowly, would have triggered the frog's escape.  And the canoe was floating over very deep detritus, making it impossible to step out without sinking out of sight...LOL.  

Once you have tried the articulating screen of the Sony A77II (and 99II), all other screens are primitive. You can also shoot from your chair using your smart phone as a screen. There are a number of macros in the A mount.

Not a lot of choices in the world of DSLR with fully articulated screens.  Mike pointed one out.  The full frame Pentax K-1 and APS-C K70 are other options.  There is also the Canon EOS 80D which of course can take any Canon EOS EF or EF-S lens so there are plenty of Canon and third party macro lens options.  In the mirrorless world, fully articulating screens are really only found in the world of m43 which I can not recommend for still photography due to the very low apertures where they become diffraction limited.  The Fuji X-T2 has a screen that articulates up/down/ and right which is likely all you need as it is designed for shooting verticals but the longest macro available is only 60mm but it is APS-C so it is full frame 90mm equivalent from a field of view perspective.  If a 60mm (90 equivalent) will work for you, then the X-T2 would be my top choice an you would save in weight and size to most other options as well.  If not, probably the EOS 80D is the best choice.

Hi Kim Have you tried tethered shooting ? or maybe a camranger wireless. http://camranger.com/

While you may be going into diffraction with m43, the files are plenty good enough for a lot of people. I used to have fantasies of making huge prints from my shots but these days not so much as I found in practice, I never did it I'm very happy with my Olympus EM-5 Mkii I bought for underwater work, basically it was cheaper to buy that camera with housing and ports and everything else needed than buy a housing for a DSLR. Plus underwater shooting through water and the optics associated with a dome port means diffraction limited photography ain't going to happen.

Having bought it I started using it for shots around the house and have been very pleased with what it produces. Often f5.6 gives enough DOF. It has the articulating screen and you can set it up for AF plus MF, AF to get close and when you grab the focus ring, focus peaking activates automatically so you judge exactly which bits of the image are in focus. And it weighs next to nothing and I can handhold at 1/60 for macro shots thanks to the in-body IS as long as the subject stays still. I still use my canon system for flashed macro as I don't have the flash and off camera capability for the Olympus body. The body plus macro lens would be about $A1500 +/-.

Kim, feel free to ask any questions, I can send you some files if you are interested.

E.J. Peiker wrote: In the mirrorless world, fully articulating screens are really only found in the world of m43 which I can not recommend for still photography due to the very low apertures where they become diffraction limited.  [snip]

Is m43 really that bad that for still photography ?? Personally I find myself rarely need to shoot with small apertures given it's inherent depth of field characteristic. Anyhow, other than the fully articulating screens, on the Olympic side, focal stacking is now automatic with some of its cameras and so no focusing rail is needed and you can shoot at f1.4 or larger if you want to for your macro shots. And some of its articulating screens are touch screens, too.

Here's something about diffraction in case anyone wants to know more about it:

LENS DIFFRACTION & PHOTOGRAPHY 

DChan wrote:

E.J. Peiker wrote: In the mirrorless world, fully articulating screens are really only found in the world of m43 which I can not recommend for still photography due to the very low apertures where they become diffraction limited.  [snip]

Is m43 really that bad that for still photography ?? Personally I find myself rarely need to shoot with small apertures given it's inherent depth of field characteristic. Anyhow, other than the fully articulating screens, on the Olympic side, focal stacking is now automatic with some of its cameras and so no focusing rail is needed and you can shoot at f1.4 or larger if you want to for your macro shots. And some of its articulating screens are touch screens, too.

Here's something about diffraction in case anyone wants to know more about it:

LENS DIFFRACTION & PHOTOGRAPHY

It's just that I think it's a dead end from a resolution standpoint.  To up the megapixels just means you are more and more diffraction limited. the current 20mp sensor is already recording diffraction at f/5.6, a 24mp sensor would be recording it at f/4.  I think its a great format for video or if you are OK with 16-20mp equivalent resolution going forward in your still photography.  Sure you can add as many pixels as you want but you aren't actually recording more info due to all of this.  So it's more about the lack of a future without tricks like sensor shifting which really only works for static subjects.  There's lots to like about m43 and Olympus makes some great cameras and lenses (I look at Panasonic as more of a video m43 company), it's just that your options in the future become more and more limited.

That said, lots of people are more than happy with 1" sensors and  tiny cell phone sensors which are basically recording diffraction all the time and therefore any megapixel increase is just a spec, it doesn't actually record any more real image data.  So everybody has to evaluate their own situation but, unless there is a compelling individual reason to recommend m43 for somebody, I can't recommend it for still photography broadly.

Thanks for all the information so far. I will do  some research on the cameras suggested.

Re the tethered shooting suggestion - I do a fair bit of tethered shooting but indoors. There is no way I can carry the laptop out in the field along with rest of the gear, plus I can't see the screen in the field as the glare is too much. I may be able to use my mobile phone so will look into that. Is there an android app that works in Live View. I could then use my D750.

Does anyone have any knowledge of shooting remotely with an app via the D750? Wi Fi or tethered. What would I need?

Robert that dragonfly shot is great. I think the quality of the light helped as much as anything.

EJ what is 'pixel shifting' - is it just a gimmick or is it a worth while tool for macro work? It is available in the Pentax cameras.

I've shot a few native orchids in my time, you can see them on my website, so often you are waiting for the wind to die down to get that one shot that I can imagine pixel shifting being a bit of a nightmare. as you need to take multiple exposures with the sensor shifted by half a pixel each time.

This is with the EM-5II with a Canon 200mm macro lens at f8 via an adapter.  It's an MF lens and works seamlessly.  Focus was via focus peaking, move the camera hand held till the peaking was showing all over the subject.

http://homepages.ihug.com.au/~chrisx2/i ... Damsel.jpg


And this is with the 60mm macro at f5.6, hand held with AF plus MF tweak with peaking.

http://homepages.ihug.com.au/~chrisx2/i ... gona3a.jpg

Here's a sample for anyone to see if the image quality is good enough for your usages:

The first one is a 100% crop in Adobe Camera Raw. Other than adjusting the exposure nothing else was done to the original raw file.

Below is the full-frame of the above. Again, nothing adjusted other than exposure.
It was taken at 6:42pm with the Olympus EM5-Mk II and 40-150 f-2.8 handheld. ISO 400, f-9, 1/200 sec.


Just wanted to throw in one more 100% crop sample for your reference No adjustment other than slight increase in exposure. Same camera, same lens @60mm (120mm in 35mm). Handheld. ISO 200 f-4, 1/320sec.

Thanks Chris and DChan. Both sets of images look fine. More research required.

Found these images from one of the Pentax camera EJ mentioned. They too look good. If you click on the 100% view there is a lot of detail.

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/4065064

Pixel shifting is where for a single shot the camera takes 4 or more photos shifting the sensor a half pixel in each direction every time and then putting them all together giving you a higher resolution then if you just took a single shot. It works fine for totally still subjects and cameras but if there is any movement at all it can be problematic.

If you look on the flora & macro forum the exact same butterfly has been photographed with a 7DII and Tamron 180mm macro mm macro. There is a link to a full res image here: http://www.simonespera.it/wp-content/up ... 5A0236.jpg

Interestingly enough the Canon shot at f11 is in diffraction (7D MkII 20.2 MP at f11) as is the Pentax K-3 shot (K3 II 24.35 MP at f10 and both pictures show every scale on the butterfly's wings. The images did not become unusable because they are in diffraction. Yes you didn't get all the possible resolution, but it's still pretty darn good. For what I'm doing my 16 MP 1D MKIV and E-M5 have enough MP to do everything I need them to.

You are not likely to see much of a difference on real world subjects on something that's just a stop or stop and a half past the diffraction limit but the difference is very visible when you are 3 stops past the limit.  Lets try to stay objective and not turn this into an ongoing defense of equipment that you use...  There's lots of gear out there, different people have different needs.  The OP specifically asked for a camera in the 20-30mp range with a fully articulating screen.  The very best IQ cameras available that meet those criteria are the Canon EOS 80D, the Sony a77 Mk II, the Pentax K3 Mk II, and the Fuji X-T2 (semi fully articulating screen).  There is no macro in the focal length range specified by the OP on the Fuji side so that is eliminated.  Next in line after the APS-C sensors are the 20mp m43 sensors on some Olympus and Panasonic cameras but they are significantly smaller sensors and limited to the very low end of the megapixel range that the OP requested.  It is unlikely that the OP wants to go backwards in pixel count from the 24mp  D5300 that they currently use.  IQ from the three APS-C cameras recommended above will be virtually indistinguishable so it comes down to what the user prefers from a features and ergonomic standpoint.

The one thing going for smaller sensors (less than FF) is the perception of greater DOF which is advantageous for macro work.

I'm only suggesting it because I use it for similar purposes and find it works very well and based on the description of using the screen to frame and focus seemed to me to be a great application for using focus peaking to get the focus on just the right spot, I expect there are other cameras out there that let you use focus peaking including the Sony, but not the Canon. No it doesn't meet the MP criteria, but I put out the challenge: Do you really need the MP, in my experience I generally don't.

Yes I know diffraction is not bad a stop or two in but progressively gets much worse, the point is you rarely need to travel deep into diffraction territory even with macro on m43 as it has that extra DOF. If you really need lots of DOF you can use focus stacking of course, the olympus offers it built in on certain models.

Taking a different tack, maybe an accessory electronic viewfinder might work well in this situation, If the camera has a HDMI one of these might be a good alternative to shelling out on a new camera or at least open up the choice of cameras.:

http://www.zacuto.com/zfinderevf

Never used one but seems like it would allow you to focus in comfort.

Hi Chris. I understand where you are coming from. My 3 cameras are all 24 MP and the latitude it allows for cropping is a wonderful asset. As you too photograph orchids in the wild then you will know that getting the orchids to fill the frame at the working distance of the lens is a challenge. I find shooting in portrait mode and cropping a little from the bottom where it is most likely to be messy gives the best results. Spider orchids with their long 'ears' and other dangle bits are hard to get pleasing results. { I am no good at scientific names} I am very good at finding them though. Plus I do a series of cards from the orchids so portrait mode suits the cards best as the portrait orientation seems to sell better than landscape.

I had a look at the device you linked to and was not to sure how it worked, it seemed to be a viewfinder.

I am still interested in finding out about apps for my mobile to use with the D750 and how I would go about that though.

Thanks for your input, it has been helpful.